His Choice
by SeraphChronoMage
Summary: The signs of grief faded from his face, leaving him once again remote. “Do what you will, but remember that it is his choice.” Character Death


Squall looked like some barbarian deity of the ice, beautiful as a crystal statue, and twice as remote. By all rights, he should have been sweating, been covered in blood, been _crying_, but he looked eerily perfect and deadly calm even though Rinoa was dying no less than a yard away.

It had been an attack by Estharian and Galbadian rebels, an anti-Sorceress faction that had managed to somehow get a hold of some exotic poison to incapacitate Rinoa, and then done a pretty good job finishing her off with some strategic gunfire. Squall had managed to kill the majority of them with nothing more than a gunblade, some ice spells, and pure fury. Now, however, that fury had faded to leave a kind of cold emptiness.

When Quistis had arrived on the scene, the first thing to greet her eyes was the sight of Squall kneeling next to her body with an expression so blank that he couldn't be thinking at all. She walked over to him, her heart breaking at the thought of what he must be going through. He had only so recently learned how to care again, and now something like this happened. But because Quistis was a mercenary, she shut away her personal grief (for the both of them) and asked in her most professional tone if he was all right.

She knew that something was wrong when he stood up and she saw his face clearly for the first time. Squall had always been attractive, but now his features were _perfect,_ every line of him set as if carved in stone. _Or ice,_ he treacherous mind whispered, _like some sculpture of ice._

Quistis was scholar enough to have gained an Instructor's post at eighteen, and now she was cursing the fact. Her brain presented her with images of temples in the north, worshipers gone without a trace, but their sublimely crafted ice statues of the gods still there after hundreds of years, wearing just the expression that Squall had on his face.

"Are you all right, Squall?" she asked again.

He looked at her blankly, as if the question was a ridiculous one. "Yes."

She cleared her throat, unnerved. "We should..." she paused, wondering where on the monstrous list of things to do she should start.

"Contact General Caraway," Squall supplied in the same monotone.

Quistis thought briefly about it. It was probably a good idea to contact Rinoa's father to let him know...She pulled herself together. But with Squall in this condition, she wasn't sure if she wanted him to deliver the news.

"Yes, that's probably a good idea. Are you sure..." she trailed off when Squall just looked at her. "Of course, Commander," she finished.

Squall nodded, then walked in the direction of _Ragnarok_. Quistis hurriedly waved one of the SeeD over and ordered him to secure the scene and, here her voice almost failed her, to get Rinoa's body ready for transport. She then hurried after Squall.

Squall had keyed the comm unit on, and was waiting patiently for the connection to be established. Quistis waited in a sort of dread. This heavy feeling in her heart only increased when the waiting screen was replaced with a visual of the General in his office.

"Yes?" Quistis almost winced, but held her composure.

Before Squall could blurt it out with typical bluntness, she said, her voice wobbling ever so slightly, "General Caraway, sir, we're sorry to disturb you but...I'm afraid we have some bad news."

Something in her faced must have worried him, she could almost see the foreboding building up. "Yes?," he said again, though this time his voice was less sure.

"It's...about your daughter," she managed, before her throat closed up.

She saw the apprehension on the General's face and couldn't find her voice. How do you tell a parent that their child was dead?

Squall's clear, calm voice broke through her paralysis. "Sir, I am sorry to inform you that your daughter is dead."

Quistis rubbed her forehead. It had been almost a month since Rinoa's death, and Squall had just gotten worse.

It didn't show in his work, of course. Squall was much too dutiful to slack off. Actually, she wished that it was that. At least then she would have a definite and arguable symptom to tell her that Squall was feeling _anything._

He had almost completely shut himself off from everyone. He barely spoke, completed his work with machinelike efficiency, and worked in the Training Center like a man possessed. If anything, his swordwork had improved to a point even greater than when they had fought against Ultimecia.

She suspected that Shiva was somehow involved in his sudden relapse into his old habits. It would certainly explain why he rarely showed even the smallest flickers of emotion anymore. Even at Rinoa's funeral, he had been perfectly composed, to the point that he had barely reacted when General Caraway had accused him of never loving his daughter. In fact, the cadets had began calling him by the appropriate moniker of "Shiva's Lover."

She shifted the stack of papers that he had requested her to bring to his quarters so that she could knock on the door. When Squall didn't answer, she keyed in the passcode and stepped inside.

Squall's quarters were spartan and minimalistic. They looked about as lived in as a hotel room. She walked through the living area, noting the table next to the sofa had an upturned picture frame on it. Quistis's curiosity got the better of her, and she walked over and picked it up. She wasn't really surprised to see that it was a picture of Rinoa, smiling happily as she wrapped her arms around Squall, who, while not as obviously cheerful, certainly didn't look unhappy.

Quistis swallowed with some difficulty, and carefully replaced the picture as it was. It was the only thing in the room that implied that someone actually lived here. It position made it clear that it was obviously too painful for Squall to look at, but too precious for him to put away.

Clearing her throat, she walked towards the bedroom, where Squall had a small office area set up. She looked through the doorway and was faintly surprised to see that Squall was asleep, laying on the bed fully clothed, eyes closed peacefully. Quistis caught her breath. Instead of the icily beautiful face that she had grown used to seeing in the past month, Squall looked like a grief riven young man who had fallen to sleep out of sheer exhaustion. Quistis looked away, feeling like she was intruding on something private, and put the papers she had come to deliver on the small desk in the corner.

She looked back, unable to help herself, and was shocked to see another person it the room, sitting on the bed. Her hand went automatically to her hip, where her whip usually hung, before she realized that the person sitting on the bed was transparent, barely there, and made no indentation in the covers. It took her another second to realize that she recognized her.

"Shiva." The Guardian Force inclined her head to Quistis, her blue hair falling across her face. Encouraged by this acknowledgment of her presence, Quistis asked, "Are you the one making him like this?" Anger colored her voice. "He's totally cut off, he doesn't talk to me, to anyone. I know there's something wrong, but every time I ask him, he says he's fine! Are you doing that?!"

Shiva's voice sounded like a blizzard condensed into speech. "I do nothing to him that has not asked me to."

"Asked you to?" Quistis felt a chill. "He _asked_ you to do this to him?"

"He asked me to give him the strength to go on." Shiva sounded regretful. "I couldn't take away the pain, but I could make him feel it less."

Quistis reeled at the thought of what Shiva had done. No, at what Squall had done. Instead of letting himself feel the grief, he had cut it away, submerged himself in ice. _And yet,_she thought, _isn't this what he's always done? Cut himself off from everyone, depending on no one?_

"Is there anything...that I—that we—can do for him?" she asked.

"He has chosen his path. He will give himself to the ice." Shiva brushed her hand against Squall's cheek. The signs of grief faded from his face, leaving him once again remote. "Do what you will, but remember that it is _his_ choice."

A.N.- I don't know where this came from. I like it though. I don't like Rinoa, so killing her off is no big deal. I actually really think this is nice.


End file.
